


Shackle

by themysteryvanishing



Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Short One Shot, war. war is hell.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-16 13:29:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29576841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themysteryvanishing/pseuds/themysteryvanishing
Summary: Elizabeth Weir encountered Dr. Janet Fraiser long before she ever knew about the Stargate Program.
Relationships: Janet Fraiser/Elizabeth Weir
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	Shackle

It’s late summer in 1998, and the American embassy in Dar es Salaam is blown up, very nearly taking her with it.

It’s her first time traveling with the diplomatic envoy she was assigned to as part of her graduate studies capstone project, a team she has become well-acquainted with over the last twelve weeks in preparation for their trip to East Africa. There’s nothing in their travel guides about surviving terrorist attacks.

There’s also nothing in any of those guides that tells someone how to feel when their studies advisor, with whom Elizabeth had been working closely for the better part of the last three years in order to make this project a reality, throws themselves over her to shield her from a ceiling that’s plummeting to the floor, amid a building that’s surging towards the ground.

She is alone amongst the countless dead, lungs burning, nearly out of air when a hazy sunbeam pierces her foxhole as rubble is cleared away. It takes everything in her to scream for help. When a disaster relief volunteer grazes her shredded knuckles as he removes a slab of concrete off her mangled arm, she has run out of voice. All she can do is sob, shoulders trembling as she holds in silent screams.

There is also nothing in the books about how to feel upon regaining consciousness in a bed at Landstuhl, with untold hours of unaccounted-for memory that find her on an entirely new continent, unable to shake the feeling of the cold weight of her advisor’s body over hers as the world crumbled around them.

When the respiratory therapist encourages her to cough as the ventilator tubing is tugged from her raw and burning throat, she feels her chest start to cave under the weight again, as if the bones themselves are not meant to bear it—cannot bear it, if the broken ribs on her chest x-ray are anything to go by—the air itself thick with blood and grief and loss.

She almost asks to be put back on the vent.

It is but for the grace of one of the military doctors there that she does not.

\- - -

It starts with a newspaper article.

Morning rounds have begun and Elizabeth is breathing hard, holding herself rigidly as she struggles to curl a five-pound weight with the arm that was crushed under the embassy rubble. She’s in bed still, her lower half still regaining its feeling, but her upper body is on fire. She wants to tear her physical therapist a new one but talking and barely lifting five whole pounds is now on a higher tier of executive function than she can reach for now.

Instead, she boils in her sweaty hospital gown.

The physical therapist, meanwhile, keeps a newspaper open on the bed beside her, consulting it between reps. Elizabeth catches sight of the headline: _Young U.S. Diplomat Sole Survivor of Embassy Bombing; Scores Killed; No Firm Motive or Suspects_.

She bristles at that. There’s bile in her throat.

She thinks of the dozens dead, and how she was supposed to be one of them.

And that’s when Doctor Fraiser appears, all five feet of her filled with righteous indignation when she takes in the sight of her red-faced patient de-satting during _physical therapy_ for chrissake, and what’s the therapist doing? _Is that a goddamn newspaper?_

“I’m sorry, am I running an intensive care unit or a Planet Fitness?” the doctor barks as she yanks the newspaper off the bed and folds it up and shoves it into her white coat, which is almost as big as she is. She pushes past the therapist to grab an oxygen mask and gently holds it to Elizabeth’s face as she cranks up the flow and waits for the numbers to crawl back up to normal.

Elizabeth, for all her confusion and exhaustion, is just grateful to be able to breathe again. She accidentally makes eye contact with this doctor, whose eyes are big and brown and wide with concern but without anger now, and something softens the thudding in her chest.

“Why don’t I get you some fresh scrubs so you don’t have to stew in a pool of your own sweat?” Doctor Fraiser asks, her voice suddenly soft, leagues kinder from seconds ago.

Elizabeth can only nod. This is the gentlest exchange she has had since before…

Before she can even finish processing the moment, the doctor is back with a pair of starched white scrubs.

Elizabeth realizes she’s not even entirely sure if she can change her own clothes right now. Her left arm is sore, so impossibly sore; her legs shackled weights on the mattress. Even the act of holding herself upright takes almost all of her concentration.

But this doctor already seems to know it. Because already, she’s untying the back of Elizabeth’s gown, the frayed edges of the ties tickling her bruised back.

“Oh, you don’t have t—” she starts.

“I’ve got you,” is all the doctor says, with a look of firm assurance as she proffers her shoulder for Elizabeth to lean onto.

Surprising herself, she does lean forward, attempting to place herself as gently against the chest of the short woman as she is able with limited muscle control. She loses her balance in the final inches and falls the rest of the way into her.

Doctor Fraiser braces Elizabeth against her, holding fast.

“Sorry,” Elizabeth breathes, unsure what to do with her mostly useless arms.

“What on earth are you apologizing for?” The doctor laughs, a deep, throaty chuckle that resonates in the hollow of Elizabeth’s chest. “Just hold onto me, if you can.”

So she does.

The woman chuckles again. “I’m Janet, by the way.”

For the first time since before the building fell on her, Elizabeth clings to a warm body, and smiles.


End file.
